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Women of AcKievement 



Written for 

The Fireside ScKools 



Under the auspices of the 

Woman's American Baptist 
Home Mission Society 



by 

BENJAMIN BRAWLEY 
Dean of MoreKouse College 

Author of " A Short History ©f the American Nefero," " The Ne&ro 
in Literature and Art," "Your Negro Neifehbor," Etc. 



'>^j^y ^' 



■«;■ X... «..•• 



Copyright, 1919 

by the 

Woman's American Baptist Home Mission Society. 



n-^iioi 



©CI.AoUS77 



CONTENTS 



I. Introduction. — The Negro Woman in Ameri- 
can Life. 

II. Harriet Tubman. 

III. Nora Gordon. 

IV. Meta Warrick Fuller. 
V. Mary McLeod Bethune. 

VI. Mary Church Terrell. 




JOANNA P. MOORE 



THE FIRESIDE SCHOOLS 

The work of the Fireside Schools was 
begun in 1884 by Joanna P. Moore, who 
was born in Clarion County, Pennsylvania, 
September 26, 1832, and who died in Selma, 
Alabama, April 15, 1916. For fifty years 
Miss Moore was well known as an earnest 
worker for the betterment of the Negro 
people of the South. Beginning in the 
course of the Civil War, at Island No. 10, 
in November, 1863, she gave herself un- 
tiringly to the work to which she felt called. 
In 1864 she ministered to a group of people 
at Helena, Arkansas. In 1868 she went to 
Lauderdale, Mississippi, to help the Friends 
in an orphan asylum. While she was at one 
time left temporarily in charge of the insti- 
tution cholera broke out, and eleven children 
died within one week; but she remained at 
her post until the fury of the plague was 
abated. She spent nine years in the vicinity 
of New Orleans, reading the Bible to those 
who could not read, writing letters in search 
of lost ones, and especially caring for the 
helpless old women that she met. In 1877 
the Woman's American Baptist Home Mis- 
sion Society gave her its first commission.^ 



6 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

The object of the Fireside Schools is to 
secure the daily prayerful study of God's 
word by having this read to parents and 
children together ; to teach parents and chil- 
dren, husbands and wives, their respective 
duties one to another ; to supply homes with 
good reading matter; and also to inculcate 
temperance, industry, neighborly helpful- 
ness, and greater attention to the work of 
the church. The publication of Hope, the 
organ of the Fireside Schools, was begun in 
1885. Closely associated with the Schools 
are the Bible Bands, a single band consist- 
ing of any two or three people in the same 
church or neighborhood who meet to review 
the lessons in Hope and to report and plan 
Christian work. All the activities are under 
the general supervision of the Woman's 
American Baptist Home Mission Society, 
though the special Fireside School head- 
quarters are at 612 Gay Street, Nashville, 
Tennessee. The present work is dedicated 
to the memory of Joanna P. Moore, and to 
the wives and mothers and sisters, now hap- 
pily numbered by the thousands, who are 
engaged in the work of the Fireside Schools. 



I. 

INTRODUCTION. 

The Ne^ro Woman in American Life 

In the history of the Negro race in America 
no more heroic work has been done than that 
performed by the Negro woman. The great 
responsibilities of life have naturally drifted 
to the men; but who can measure the pa- 
tience, the love, the self-sacrifice of those 
who in a more humble way have labored for 
their people and even in the midst of war 
striven most earnestly to keep the home- 
fires burning? Even before emancipation a 
strong character had made herself felt in 
more than one community; and to-day, 
whether in public life, social service, educa- 
tion, missions, business, literature, music, or 
even the professions and scholarship, the 
Negro woman is making her way and re- 
flecting credit upon a race that for so many 
years now has been struggling to the light. 

It was but natural that those should first 
become known who were interested in the 
uplift of the race. If we except such an 
unusual and specially gifted spirit as Phillis 



8 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

Wheatley, we shall find that those who most 
impressed the American public before the 
Civil War were the ones who best identified 
themselves with the general struggle for 
freedom. Outstanding was the famous lec- 
turer, Sojourner Truth. This remarkable 
woman was born of slave parents in the 
state of New York about 1798. She recalled 
vividly in her later years the cold, damp 
cellar-room in which slept the slaves of the 
family to which she belonged, and where she 
was taught by her mother to repeat the 
Lord's Prayer and to trust God at all times. 
When in the course of the process of gradual 
emancipation in New York she became le- 
gally free in 1827, her master refused to 
comply with the law. She left, but was 
pursued and found. Rather than have her 
go back, however, a friend paid for her 
services for the rest of the year. Then there 
came an evening when, searching for one of 
her children that had been stolen and sold, 
she found herself without a resting-place 
for the night. A Quaker family, however, 
gave her lodging. Afterwards she went to 
New York City, joined a Methodist church, 
and worked hard to improve her condition. 
Later, having decided to leave New York 
for a lecture tour through the East, she 
made a small bundle of her belongings and 



INTRODUCTION 9 

informed a friend that her name was no 
longer Isabella^ as she had been known, but 
Sojourner, Afterwards, as she herself said, 
finding that she needed two names she 
adopted Truth, because it was intended that 
she should declare the truth to the people. 
She went on her way, lecturing to people 
wherever she found them assembled and be- 
ing entertained in many aristocratic homes. 
She was entirely untaught in the schools, 
but tall and of commanding presence, origi- 
nal, witty, and always suggestive. The sto- 
ries told about her are numberless; but she 
was ever moved by an abiding trust in God, 
and she counted among her friends many of 
the most distinguished Americans of her 
time. By her tact and her gift of song she 
kept down ridicule, and by her fervor and 
faith she won many friends for the anti- 
slavery cause. 

It was impossible of course for any single 
woman to carry on the tradition of such a 
character as Sojourner Truth. She be- 
longed to a distinct epoch in the country's 
history, one in which the rights of the Negro 
and the rights of woman in general were 
frequently discussed on the same platform; 
and she passed — so far as her greatest influ- 
ence was concerned — with her epoch. In 



10 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

more recent years those women who have 
represented the race before the larger public 
have been persons of more training and cul- 
ture, though it has been practically impos- 
sible for any one to equal the native force 
and wit of Sojourner Truth. Outstanding 
in recent years have been Mrs. Booker T. 
Washington and Mrs. Mary Church Terrell. 
The spread of culture, however, and the 
general force of the social emphasis have 
more and more led those who were inter- 
ested in social betterment to come together 
so that there might be the greater effect 
from united effort. Thus we have had de- 
veloping in almost all of our cities and towns 
various clubs working for the good of the 
race, whether the immediate aim was literary 
culture, an orphanage, an old folks' home, 
the protection of working girls, or some- 
■5:hing else similarly noble. Prominent among 
the pioneers in such work were Mrs. Joseph- 
ine St. Pierre Ruffin, of Boston, and Mrs. 
John T. Cook, of Washington, D. C. No 
one can record exactly how much has been 
accomplished by these organizations; in fact, 
the clubs range all the way in effectiveness 
from one that is a dominating force in its 
town to one that is struggling to get started. 
The result of the work, however, would in 
any case sum up with an astonishing total. 



INTRODUCTION 11 

A report from Illinois, fairly representative 
of the stronger work, mentioned the follow- 
ing activities: "The Cairo hospital, fostered 
and under the supervision of the Yates Club 
of Cairo; the Anna Field Home for Girls, 
Peoria; Lincoln Old Folks' and Orphans' 
Home, founded by Mrs. Eva Monroe and 
assisted by the Women's Club of Spring- 
field; the Home for Aged and Infirm Col- 
ored People, Chicago, founded by Mrs. 
Gabrella Smith and others; the Amanda 
Smith Orphans' Home, Harvey; the Phillis 
Wheatley Home for Wage-Earning Girls, 
of Chicago." In Alabama the State Feder- 
ation of Colored Women's Clubs has estab- 
lished and is supporting a reformatory at 
Mt. Meigs for Negro boys, and the women 
are very enthusiastic about the work. A 
beautiful and well ordered home for Negro 
girls was established a few years ago in 
Virginia. Of the White Rose Mission of 
New York we are told that it "has done 
much good. A large number of needy ones 
have found shelter within its doors and have 
been able to secure work of all kinds. This 
club has a committee to meet the incoming 
steamers from the South and see that young 
women entering the city as strangers are 
directed to proper homes." All such work 



12 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

is touching in its tenderness and effective- 
ness. The National Association of Colored 
Women's Clubs was founded in 1896. 
The organization has become stronger and 
stronger until it is now a powerful and 
effective one with hundreds of members. 
One of its recent activities has been the pur- 
chase of the home of Frederick Douglass at 
Anacostia, D. C. 

In education, church life, and missions — 
special forms of social service — we have only 
to look around us to see what the Negro 
woman is accomplishing. Not only is she 
bearing the brunt of common school educa- 
tion for the race; in more than one instance 
a strong character, moved to do something, 
has started on a career of success a good 
secondary or industrial school. Representa- 
tive are the Voorhees Normal and Industrial 
School, at Denmark, S. C, founded by 
Elizabeth C. Wright; the Daytona Normal 
and Industrial Institute for Negro Girls, 
founded by Mrs. M. M. Bethune; and the 
Mt. Meigs Institute, Mt. Meigs, Alabama, 
founded by Miss Cornelia Bowen. Note- 
worthy for its special missionary emphasis 
is the National Training School of Wash- 
ington, of which Miss Nannie H. Burroughs 
is the head. One of the most important 
recent developments in education has been 



INTRODUCTION 13/ 

the appointment of a number of young 
women as supervisors in county schools 
under the terms of the will of Anna T. 
Jeanes, a Quaker lady of Philadelphia who 
left a considerable sum of money for the 
improvement of the rural schools of the 
South. In church work we all know the 
extent to which women have had to bear the 
burden not only of the regular activities but 
also of the numerous "rallies" that still so 
unfortunately afflict our churches. Deserv- 
ing of special mention in connection with 
social service is the work of those who have 
labored under the auspices of the Young 
Women's Christian Association, which has 
done so much for the moral well-being of the 
great camps in the war. In foreign mission 
work one of the educational institutions sus- 
tained primarily by Northern Baptist agen- 
cies — Spelman Seminary — stands out with 
distinct prominence. Not only has Spelman 
sent to Africa several of her daughters from 
this country, the first one being Nora Gor- 
don in 1889; she has also educated several 
who have come to her from Africa, the first 
being Lena Clark, and for these the hope 
has ever been that they would return to their 
own country for their largest and most 
mature service. 



14 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

In the realm of business the Negro woman 
has stood side by side with her husband in 
the rise to higher things. In almost every 
instance in which a man has prospered, in- 
vestigation will show that his advance was 
very largely due to the faith, the patience, 
and the untiring effort of his wife. Dr. 
B. T. Washington, in his book The Negro in 
Business, gave several examples. One of 
the outstanding instances was in the story 
of Junius G. Groves, famous potato grower 
of Edwardsville, Kansas. This man moved 
from his original home in Kentucky to 
Kansas at the time of the well-known 
"Exodus" of 1879, a migration movement 
which was even more voluntary on the part 
of the Negro than the recent removal to the 
North on the part of so many, this latter 
movement being in so many ways a result of 
war conditions. Mr. Groves in course of 
time became a man of large responsibilities 
and means. It is most interesting, however, 
to go back to his early days of struggle. We 
read as follows: "Soon after getting the 
crop planted JNIr. Groves decided to marry. 
"When he reached this decision he had but 
seventy-five cents in cash, and had to borrow 
enough to satisfy the demands of the law. 
But he knew well the worth and common 
sense of the woman he was to marjy. .She 



INTRODUCTION 15 

was as poor in worldly goods as himself; but 
their poverty did not discourage them in 
their plans. * * * * During the whole 
season they worked with never-tiring energy, 
early and late ; with the result that when the 
crop had been harvested and all debts paid 
they had cleared $125. Notwithstanding 
their lack of many necessaries of life, to say 
nothing of comforts, they decided to invest 
$50 of their earnings in a lot in Kansas City, 
Kansas. They paid $25 for a milk cow, and 
kept the remaining $50 to be used in the 
making of another crop." In the course of 
a few years Mr. Groves, with the help of 
his wife, now the mother of a large family, 
gathered in one year hundreds of thousands 
of bushels of white potatoes, surpassing all 
other growers in the world. Similarly was 
the success of E. C. Berry, a hotel-keeper of 
Athens, Ohio, due to his wife. "At night, 
after his guests had fallen asleep, it was his 
custom to go around and gather up their 
clothes and take them to his wife, who would 
add buttons which were lacking, repair rents, 
and press the garments, after which Mr. 
Berry would replace them in the guests' 
rooms. Guests who had received such treat- 
ment returned again and brought their 
friends with them." In course of time Mr. 
«^d Mrs. Berry came to own the leading 



16 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

hotel in Athens, one of fifty rooms and of 
special favor with commercial travelers. 

Such examples could be multiplied indefi- 
nitely. It is not only in such spheres that 
the worth of the Negro woman has been 
shown, however. Daily, in thousands of 
homes, in little stores and on humble farms, 
effort just as heroic has been exerted, 
though the result is not always so evident. 
On their own initiative also women are now 
engaging in large enterprises. The most 
conspicuous example of material success is 
undoubtedly Mme. C. J. Walker, of the 
Mme. C. J. Walker JNIanufacturing Com- 
pany, of Indianapolis and New York, a 
business that is now conducted on a large 
scale and in accordance with the best busi- 
ness methods of America. Important also 
in this connection is the very great contribu- 
tion that Negro women — very often those 
without education and opportunity — are 
making in the ordinary industrial life of the 
country. According to the census of 1910, 
1,047,146, or 52 per cent, of those at work, 
were either farmers or farm laborers, and 
28 per cent, more were either cooks or wash- 
erwomen. In other words, a total of ex- 
actly 80 per cent, were doing some of the 
hardest and at the same time some of the 
most necessary work in our home and indus- 



INTRODUCTION 17 

trial life. These are workers whose worth 
has never been fully appreciated by the 
larger public, and who needed the heavy 
demands of the great war to call attention 
to the actual value of the service they were 
rendering. 

The changes in fact brought about within 
the last few years, largely as a result of war 
conditions, are remarkable. As Mary E. 
Jackson, writing in the Crisis, has said: 
"Indiana reports [Negro women] in g:lass 
works ; in Ohio they are found on the night 
shifts of glass works; they have gone into 
the pottery works in Virginia; wood-work- 
ing plants and lumber yards have called for 
their help in Tennessee." She also quotes 
Rachel S. Gallagher, of Cleveland, Ohio, as 
saying of the Negro women in that city: 
"We find them on power sewing-machines, 
making caps, waists, bags, and mops; we 
find them doing pressing and various hand 
operations in these same shops. They are 
employed in knitting factories as winders, 
in a number of laundries on mangles of 
every type, and in sorting and marking. 
They are in paper box factories doing both 
hand and machine work, in button factories 
on the button machines, in packing houses 
packing meat, in railroad yards wiping and 



18 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

cleaning engines, and doing sorting in rail- 
road shops. One of our workers recently- 
found two colored girls on a knotting ma- 
chine in a bed spring factory, putting the 
knots in the wire springs." 

In the professions, such as medicine and 
law, and in scholarship as well, the Negro 
woman has blazed a path. One year after 
Oberlin College in Ohio was founded in 
1833, thirty years before the issuing of the 
Emancipation Proclamation, the trustees 
took the advanced ground of admitting 
Negro men and women on equal terms with 
other students. Of the Northern colleges 
and universities Oberlin still leads in the 
number of its Negro women graduates, but 
in recent years other such institutions as 
Radcliffe, 'Wellesley, Columbia, and Chi- 
cago have been represented in an increasing 
number by those who have finished their 
work creditably and even with distinction in 
many instances. More and more each year 
are young women at these institutions going 
forward to the attainment of the higher 
scholastic degrees.\In connection with medi- 
cine we recall the work in the war of the 
Negro woman in the related profession of 
nursing. It was only after considerable dis- 
cussion that she was given a genuine oppor- 



INTRODUCTION 19 

tunity in Red Cross work, but she at once 
vindicated herself. In the legal profession 
she has not only been admitted to practice 
in various places, but has also been ap- 
pointed to public office. It must be under- 
stood that such positions as those just re- 
marked are not secured without a struggle, 
but all told they indicate that the race 
through its womanhood is more and more 
taking part in the general life of the country. 

In keeping with the romantic quality of 
the race it was but natural that from the first 
there should have been special effort at self- 
expression in literature, music, and other 
forms of art. The first Negro woman to 
strike the public imagination was Phillis 
Wheatley, who even as a young girl wrote 
acceptable verse. Her Poems on Various 
Subjects published in 1773 at once at- 
tracted attention, and it was fitting that the 
first Negro woman to become distinguished 
in America should be one of outstanding 
piety and nobility of soul. Just a few years 
before the Civil War Frances Ellen Wat- 
kins, better known as Mrs. F. E. W. Har- 
per, entered upon her career as a writer of 
popular poetry. At the present time at- 
tention centers especially upon Mrs. Geor- 
gia Douglas Johnson, who early in 1918 



20 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

produced in The Heart of a Woman sl 
little volume of delicate and poignantly 
beautiful verse, and from whom greater and 
greater things are expected, as she not only 
has the temperament of an artist but has 
also undergone a period of severe training 
in her chosen field. In the wider field of 
prose — including especially stories, essays, 
and sketches — Mrs. Alice Moore Dunbar- 
Nelson is prominent. In 1899 she pro- 
duced The Goodness of St. Rocque, and 
other stories, and since then has continued 
her good work in various ways. The whole 
field of literature is a wide one, one natu- 
rally appealing to many of the younger 
women, and one that with all its difficulties 
and lack of financial return does offer some 
genuine reward to the candidate who is will- 
ing to work hard and who does not seek a 
short cut to fame. 

In music the race has produced more 
women of distinction than in any other field. 
This was natural, for the Negro voice is 
world famous. The pity is that all too fre- 
quently some of the most capable young 
women have not had the means to cultivate 
their talents and hence have fallen by the 
wayside. Some day it is to be hoped that a 
great philanthropist will endow a real con- 



INTRODUCTION 21 

servatory at which such persons may find 
some genuine opportunity and encourage- 
ment in their development in their days of 
struggle. In spite of all the difficulties, 
however, there have been singers who have 
risen to very high things in their art. Even 
before the Civil War the race produced one 
of the first rank in Elizabeth Taylor Green- 
field, who came into prominence in 1851. 
This artist, born in Mississippi, was taken 
to Philadelphia and there cared for by a 
Quaker lady. The young woman did not 
soon reveal her gift to her friend, thinking 
that it might be frowned upon as something 
too worldly. Her guardian learned of it by 
accident, however, and one day surprised her 
by asking, "Elizabeth, is it true that thee can 
sing?" "Yes," replied the young woman in 
confusion. "Let me hear thee." And Eliza- 
beth sang ; and her friend, realizing that she 
had a voice of the first quality, proceeded to 
give her the best instruction that it was pos- 
sible to get. Elizabeth Taylor Greenfield 
had a marvelous voice embracing twenty- 
seven notes, reaching from the sonorous bass 
of a baritone to the highest soprano. A 
voice with a range of more than three oc- 
taves naturally attracted much attention in 
both England and America, and compari- 
sons with Jenny Lind, then at the height of 



22 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

her great fame, were frequent. In the next 
generation arose Madame Selika, a cultured 
singer of the first rank, and one who by her 
arias and operatic work generally, as well 
as by her mastery of language, won great 
success on the continent of Europe as well 
as in England and America. The careers 
of some later singers are so recent as to be 
still fresh in the public memory; some in 
fact may still be heard. It was in 1887 that 
Flora Batson entered on the period of her 
greatest success. She was a ballad singer 
and her work at its best was of the sort that 
sends an audience into the wildest enthusi- 
asm. In a series of temperance meetings in 
New York she sang for ninety consecutive 
nights, with never-failing effect, one song, 
"Six Feet of Earth Make Us All One Size." 
Her voice exhibited a compass of three oc- 
taves, but even more important than its 
range was its remarkable sympathetic qual- 
ity. Early in the last decade of the century 
appeared also Mrs. Sissieretta Jones, whose 
voice at once commanded attention as one of 
unusual richness and volume, and as one 
exhibiting especially the plaintive quality 
ever present in the typical Negro voice. 

At the present time there are several 
promising singers; and there are also those 



INTRODUCTION 23 

who in various ways are working for the 
general advancement of the race in music. 
Mrs. E. Azalia Hackley, for some years 
prominent as a concert soprano, has recently 
given her time most largely to the work of 
teaching and showing the capabilities of the 
Negro voice. Possessed of a splendid 
musical temperament, she has enjoyed the 
benefit of three years of foreign study and 
generally inspired many younger singers or 
performers. Prominent among many ex- 
cellent pianists is Mrs. Hazel Harrison 
Anderson, who also has studied much 
abroad and who has appeared in many 
noteworthy recitals. Mrs. Maud Cuney 
Hare, of Boston, a concert pianist, has 
within the last few years given several ex- 
cellent lecture-recitals dealing with Afro- 
American music. 

As between painting and sculpture the 
women of the race have shown a decided 
preference for sculpture. While there are 
some students of promise, no woman has as 
yet achieved distinction on work of reallj^ 
professional quality in the realm of painting. 
On the other hand there have been three or 
four sculptors of genuine merit. As early 
as 1865 Edmonia Lewis began to attract at- 
tention by her busts of prominent people. 



24 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

Within the last few years the work of Mrs. 
May Howard Jackson, of Washington, has 
attracted the attention of the discerning; 
and that of Mrs. Meta Warrick Fuller is 
reserved for special comment. 

Any such review as this naturally has its 
limitations. We can indicate only a few of 
the outstanding individuals here and there. 
At least enough has been said, however, to 
show that the Negro woman is making her 
way at last into every phase of noble en- 
deavor. In the pages that follow we shall 
attempt to set forth at somewhat greater 
length the life and work of a few of those 
whose achievement has been most signal and 
whose interest in their sisters has been 
unfailing. 




'^^IN MEMORY OF 

!~RRrSliiPBMAN 

BOPN A SLA"/E IN MAKfLAND /.BOUT i82i 
1 DIED IN AUBURN. N?J^ MARCH. IOT"Hj9i3 



CALLED THE MQbbb Ut HtK i^tui^ut:., 
DURING THE CIVIL WAR, WITH RARE 
COUPAGE,SHE LED OVERTHREE HUNDRED 

i NEGROES UP FROM SLA^^RYT^^DOM, 
, AND RENDERTO INVALUABLaBHplCE 

J. ' AS NURSE AND SPYr 

r WITH IMPLICIT TRUST IN GOD 

SHE BRAVED EVERY DANGER AND 
:; OVERCAME rx^ERY OBSTACLE, 'WITPxAL 
;f SHE POSSESSED EXTRAORDINARY 
i FORESIGHT AND JUDGMENT SQ ' 
i SHE TRUTHFULLY SAlEl 

I "ON MY UNDERGROUND PA.ILROAD 
I I NEBBER RUN MY TRAIN OFF DE TRACK 
li AND I NEBBER L^S^^SSENGER: 

^ TH IS TABLET IS ERECTED . 

^ BY THE CITIZENS.OF AUBURN 




Used through courtesy of John Williams, Inc , Bronze Foundry and Iron Works, 



HARRIET TUBMAN 



II. 



HARRIET TUBMAN* 

Greatest of all the heroines of anti-slav- 
ery was Harriet Tubman. This brave 
woman not only escaped from bondage her- 
self, but afterwards made nineteen distinct 
trips to the South, especially to Maryland, 
and altogether aided more than three hun- 
dred souls in escaping from their fetters. 

Araminta Ross, better known by the 
Christian name Harriet that she adopted, 
and her married name of Tubman, was born 
about 1821 in Dorchester County, on the 
eastern shore of Maryland, the daughter of 
Benjamin Ross and Harriet Greene, both 
of whom were slaves, but who were privi- 
leged to be able to live their lives in a state 

I of singular fidelity. Harriet had ten broth- 
ers and sisters, not less than three of whom 

li she rescued from slavery; and in 1857, at 
great risk to herself, she also took away to 
the North her aged father and mother. 



•While this sketch is drawn from various sources, I feel 
specially indebted to Sarah H. Bradford's "Harriet, the Moses 
of Her People." This valuable work in turn includes a scholarly 
article taken from the "Boston Commonwealth" of 1863 and 
loaned to Mrs. Bradford by F. R. Sanborn. This article is really 
the foundation of the sketch. — B. B. 

27 



28 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

When Harriet was not more than six 
years old she was taken away from her 
mother and sent ten miles away to learn the 
trade of weaving. Among other things she 
was set to the task of watching muskrat 
traps, which work compelled her to wade 
much in water. Once she was forced to 
work when she was already ill with the 
measles. She became very sick, and her 
mother now persuaded her master to let the 
girl come home for a while. 

Soon after Harriet entered her teens she 
suffered a misfortune that embarrassed her 
all the rest of her life. She had been hired 
out as a field hand. It was the fall of the 
year and the slaves were busy at such tasks 
as husking corn and cleaning up wheat. 
One of them ran away. He was found. The 
overseer swore that he should be whipped 
and called on Harriet and some others that 
happened to be near to help tie him. She 
refused, and as the slave made his escape she 
placed herself in a door to help to stop pur- 
suit of him. The overseer caught up a two- 
pound weight and threw it at the fugitive; 
but it missed its mark and struck Harriet a 
blow on the head that was almost fatal. Her 
skull was broken and from this resulted a 
pressure on her brain which all her life left 



HARRIET TUBMAN 29 

her subject to fits of somnolency. Some- 
times these would come upon her in the 
midst of a conversation or any task at which 
she might be engaged; then after a while 
the spell would pass and she could go on as 
before. 

After Harriet recovered sufficiently from 
her blow she lived for five or six years in 
the home of one John Stewart, working at 
first in the house but afterwards hiring her 
time. She performed the most arduous 
labor in order to get the fifty or sixty dollars 
ordinarily exacted of a woman in her situa- 
tion. She drove oxen, plowed, cut wood, 
and did many other such things. With her 
firm belief in Providence, in her later years 
she referred to this work as a blessing in 
disguise as it gave her the firm constitution 
necessary for the trials and hardships that 
were before her. Sometimes she worked for 
her father, who was a timber inspector and 
superintended the cutting and hauling of 
large quantities of timber for the Baltimore 
ship-yards. Her regular task in this em- 
ployment was the cutting of half a cord of 
wood a day. 

About 1844 Harriet was married to a free 
man named John Tubman. She had no 



30 W03IEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

children. Two years after her escape in 
1849 she traveled back to Maryland for her 
husband, only to find him married to another 
woman and no longer caring to live with 
her. She felt the blow keenly, but did not ' 
despair and more and more gave her 
thought to what was to be the great work 
of her life. 

It was not long after her marriage that 
Harriet began seriously to consider the mat- 
ter of escape from bondage. Already in 
her mind her people were the Israelites in 
the land of Egypt, and far off in the North 
somewhere was the land of Canaan. In 
1849 the master of her plantation died, and 
word passed around that at any moment she 
and two of her brothers were to be sold to 
the far South. Harriet, now twenty- four "" 
years old, resolved to put her long cherished 
dreams into effect. She held a consultation 
with her brothers and they decided to start 
with her at once, that very night, for the 
North. She could not go away, however, 
without giving some intimation of her pur- 
pose to the friends she was leaving behind. 
As it was not advisable for slaves to be seen 
too much talking together, she went among 
her old associates singing as follows: 



f 



HARRIET TUBMAN 81 



When dat ar ol' chariot cornea 

I'm gwine to leabe you; 
I'm boun' for de Promised Land; 

Frien's, I'm gwine to leabe you. 

I'm sorry, frien's, to leabe you; 

Pai'ewell! oh, farewell! 
But I'll meet you in de mornin'; 

Farewell! oh, farewell! 

' I'll meet you in de mornin' 

When you reach de Promised Land; 
On de Oder side of Jordan, 

For I'm boun' for de Promised Land. 

The brothers started with her; but the 
way was unknown, the North was far 
away, and they were constantly in terror 
of recapture. They turned back, and Har- 
riet, after watching their retreating forms, 
again fixed her eyes on the north star. 
""I had reasoned dis out in my min'," said 
she; "there was one of two things I had a 
right to, liberty or death. If I could not 

' have one, I would have de other, for no man 
should take me alive. I would fight for my 
liberty as long as my strength lasted, and 

Jwhen de time came for me to go, the Lord 
would let them take me." 

"And so without money, and without 
friends," says Mrs. Bradford, "she started 
on through unknown regions; walking by 
night, hiding by day, but always conscious 



32 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

of an invisible pillar of cloud by day, and of 
fire by night, under the guidance of which 
she journeyed or rested. Without knowing 
whom to trust, or how near the pursuers 
might be, she carefully felt her way, and by 
her native cunning, or by God-given wisdom 
she managed to apply to the right people for 
food, and sometimes for shelter; though 
often her bed was only the cold ground, and 
her watchers the stars of night. After 
many long and weary days of travel, she 
found that she had passed the magic line 
which then divided the land of bondage from 
the land of freedom." At length she came to 
Philadelphia, where she found work and the 
opportunity to earn a little money. It was 
at this time, in 1851, after she had been em- 
ploj^ed for some months, that she went back 
to Maryland for her husband only to find 
that he had not been true. 

In December, 1850, she had visited Balti- 
more and brought away a sister and two 
children. A few months afterwards she took 
away a brother and two other men. In De- 
cember, 1851, she led out a party of eleven, 
among them being another brother and his 
wife. With these she journeyed to Canada, 
for the Fugitive Slave Law was now in 
force and, as she quaintly said, there was 



H AERIE T TUBMAN 33 

no safety except "under the paw of the 
British Lion." The winter, however, was 
hard on the poor fugitives, who unused to 
the climate of Canada, had to chop wood in 
the forests in the snow. Often they were 
frost-bitten, hungry, and almost always 
poorly clad. But Harriet was caring for 
them. She kept house for her brother, and 
the fugitives boarded with her. She begged 
for them and prayed for them, and some- 
how got them through the hard winter. In 
the spring she returned to the States, as 
usual working in hotels and families as a 
cook. In 1852 she once more went to 
Maryland, this time bringing away nine 
fugitives. 

It must not be supposed that those who 
started on the journey northward were 
always strong-spirited characters. The 
road was rough and attended by dangers 
innumerable. Sometimes the fugitives grew 
faint-hearted and wanted to turn back. 
Then would come into play the pistol that 
Harriet always carried with her. "Dead 
niggers tell no tales," said she, pointing it 
at them; "you go on or die!" By this he- 
roic method she forced many to go onward 
and win the goal of freedom. 



34 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

Unfailing was Harriet Tubman's confi- 
dence in God. A customary form of prayer 
for her was, "O Lord, youVe been with me 
in six troubles; be with me in the seventh." 
On one of her journeys she came with a 
party of fugitives to the home of a Negro 
who had more than once assisted her and 
whose house was one of the regular stations 
on the so-called Underground Railroad. 
Leaving her party a little distance away 
Harriet went to the door and gave the pe- 
culiar rap that was her regular signal. Not 
meeting with a ready response, she knocked 
several times. At length a window was 
raised and a white man demanded roughly 
what she wanted. When Harriet asked for 
her friend she was informed that he had been 
obliged to leave for assisting Negroes. 
The situation was dangerous. Day was 
breaking and something had to be done at 
once. A prayer revealed to Harriet a place 
of refuge. Outside of the town she remem- 
bered that there was a little island in a 
swamp, with much tall grass upon it. 
Hither she conducted her party, carrying in 
a basket two babies that had been drugged. 
All were cold and hungry in the wet grass ; 
still Harriet prayed and waited for deliver- 
ance. How relief came she never knew; she 
felt that it was not necessarily her business 



HARRIET TUBMAN 35 

to know. After they had waited through 
the day, however, at dusk there came slowly 
along the pathway on the edge of the 
swamp a man clad in the garb of a Quaker. 
He seemed to be talking to himself, but 
Harriet's sharp ears caught the words : "My 
wagon stands in the barnyard of the next 
farm across the way. The horse is in the 
stable; the harness hangs on a nail;" and 
then the man was gone. When night came 
Harriet stole forth to the place designated, 
and found not only the wagon but also 
abundant provisions in it, so that the whole 
party was soon on its way rejoicing. In the 
next town dwelt a Quaker whom Harriet 
knew and who readily took charge of the 
horse and wagon for her. 

Naturally the work of such a woman 
could not long escape the attention of the 
abolitionists. She became known to Thomas 
Garrett, the great-hearted Quaker of Wil- 
mington, who aided not less than three thou- 
sand fugitives to escape, and also to Gerrit 
Smith, Wendell Phillips, William H. 
Seward, F. B. Sanborn, and many other 
notable men interested in the emancipation 
of the Negro. From time to time she was 
supplied with money, but she never spent 
this for her own use, setting it aside in case 



36 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

of need on the next one of her journeys. 
In her earlier years, however, before she 
became known, she gave of her own slender 
means for the work. 

Between 1852 and 1857 she made but one 
or two journeys, because of the increasmg 
vigilance of slaveholders and the Fugitive 
Slave Law. Great rewards were oif ered for 
her capture and she was several times on the 
point of being taken, but always escaped by 
her shrewd wit and what she considered 
warnings from heaven. While she was in- 
tensely practical, she was also a most firm 
believer in dreams. In 1857 she made her 
most venturesome journey, this time taking 
with her to the North her old parents who 
were no longer able to walk such distances 
as she was forced to go by night. Accord- 
ingly she had to hire a wagon for them, and 
it took all her ingenuity to get them through 
Maryland and Delaware. At length, how- 
ever, she got them to Canada, where they 
spent the winter. As the climate was too 
rigorous, however, she afterwards brought 
them down to New York, and settled them 
in a home in Auburn, N. Y., that she had 
purchased on very reasonable term.s from 
Secretary Seward. Somewhat later a mort- 
gage on the place had to be lifted and 



HABBIET TUBMAN 37 

Harriet now made a noteworthy visit to 
Boston, returning with a handsome sum 
toward the payment of her debt. At this 
time she met John Brown more than once, 
seems to have learned something of his 
plans, and after the raid at Harper's Ferry 
and the execution of Brown she glorified 
him as a hero, her veneration even becoming 
religious. Her last visit to Maryland was 
made in December, 1860, and in spite of the 
agitated condition of the country and the 
great watchfulness of slaveholders she 
brought away with her seven fugitives, one 
of them an infant. 

After the war Harriet Tubman made 
Auburn her home, establishing there a ref- 
uge for aged Negroes. She married again, 
so that she is sometimes referred to as 
Harriet Tubman Davis. She died at a very 
advanced age March 10, 1913. On Friday, 
June 12, 1914, a tablet in her honor was un- 
veiled at the Auditorimn in Albany. It was 
provided by the Cayuga County Historical 
Association, Dr. Booker T. Washington 
was the chief speaker of the occasion, and 
the ceremonies were attended by a great 
crowd of people. 

The tributes to this heroic woman were 
remarkable. Wendell Phillips said of her: 



38 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

"In my opinion there are few captains, per- 
haps few colonels, who have done more for 
the loyal cause since the war began, and few 
men who did before that time more for the 
colored race than our fearless and most sa- 
gacious friend, Harriet." F. B. Sanborn 
wrote that what she did "could scarcely be 
credited on the best authority." William H. 
Seward, who labored, though unsuccess- 
fully, to get a pension for her granted by 
Congress, consistently praised her noble 
spirit. Abraham Lincoln gave her ready 
audience and lent a willing ear to whatever 
she had to say. Frederick Douglass wrote 
to her: "The difference between us is very 

ft/ 

marked. Most that I have done and suf- 
fered in the service of our cause has been in 
public, and I have received much encourage- 
ment at every step of the way. You, on the 
other hand, have labored in a private way. 
I have wrought in the day — you in the night. 
I have had the applause of the crowd and the 
satisfaction that comes of being approved by 
the multitude, while the most that you have 
done has been witnessed by a few trembling, 
scarred, and footsore bondmen and women, 
whom you have led out of the house of bond- 
age, and whose heartfelt 'God bless you' has 
been your only reward." 



HARRIET TUBMAN S9 

Of such mould was Harriet Tubmaii^ 
philanthropist and patriot, bravest and no- 
blest of all the heroines of freedom. 




NORA A. GORDON 



NORA GORDON 



I 



i 



III. 
NORA GORDON 

This is the story of a young woman who 
had not more than ordinary advantages, but 
who in our own day by her love for Christ 
and her zeal in his service was swept from 
her heroic labor into martyrdom. 

When Nora Gordon went from Spelman 
Seminary as a missionary to the Congo, she 
had the hope that in some little way she 
might be used for the furtherance of the 
Master's kingdom. She coLild hardly have 
foreseen that she would start in her beloved 
school a glorious tradition; and still less 
I could she have seen the marvellous changes 
; taking place in the Africa of the present. 
I She had boundless faith, however, — faith in 
God and in the ultimate destiny of her peo- 
ple. In that faith she lived, and for that 
faith she died. 

Nora Antonia Gordon was born in Co- 
lumbus, Georgia, August 25, 1866. After 



43 



44 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

receiving her early education in the public 
schools of La Grange, in the fall of 1882 she 
came to Spelman Seminary. It was not 
long before her life became representative 
of the transforming power of Christianity. 
Being asked, "Do you love Christ?" she an- 
swered "Yes"; but when there came the 
question, "Are you a Christian?" she replied 
"No." It was not long, however, before she 
gained firmer faith, and two months after 
her entrance at Spelman she was definitely 
converted. Now followed seven 3^ears of 
intense activity and growth — of study, of 
summer teaching, of talks before temper- 
ance societies, of service of any possible 
sort for the Master. She brought to Christ 
every girl who was placed to room with her. 
A classmate afterwards testified of her that 
the girls alwa5^s regarded Nora somewhat 
differently from the others. She was the 
counsellor of her friends, ever ready with 
sweet words of comfort, and yet ever a 
cheerful companion. In one home in which 
she lived for a while she asked the privilege 
of having prayer. The man of the house at 
first refused to kneel and the woman seemed 
not interested. In course of tim.e, however, 
the wife was won and then the man also 
knelt. At another time she wrote, "Twenty- 
six of my scholars were baptized to-day;" 



NORA GORDON 45 

and a little later she said, "Ten more have 
been added." 

In 1885 Nora Gordon completed her 
course in the Industrial Department, in 
1886 the Elementary Normal, and in 1888 
! the Higher Normal Course. Her gradua- 
j tion essay was on the rather old and sopho- 
I moric subject, "The Influence of Woman 
on National Character;" but in the intensity 
of her convictions and her words there was 
nothing ordinary. She said in part: "Let 
no woman feel that life to her means simply 
living ; but let her rather feel that she has a 
special mission assigned her, which none 
other of God's creatures can perform. It 
may be that she is placed in some rude little 
hut as mother and wife; if so, she can dig- 
nify her position by turning every hut into 
a palace, and bringing not onl}^ her own 

I household, but the whole community, into 
the sunlight of God's love. Such women are 

, often unnoticed by the world in general, and 
do not receive the appreciation due them; 
yet we believe such may be called God's 
chosen agents." Finally, "we feel that 

II woman is under a twofold obligation to con- 
secrate her whole being to Christ. Our peo- 
ple are to be educated and christianized and 



46 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

the heathen brought home to God. Woman 
must take the lead in this great work." * 

After her graduation in 1888 Nora Gor- 
don was appointed to teach in the public 
schools of Atlanta. She soon resigned this 
work, however, in the contemplation of the 
great mission of her life. The secretary of 
the Society of the West wrote to Spelman 
to inquire if there was any one who could go 
to assist Miss Fleming, a missionary at work 
in Palabala in the Congo. Four names were 
sent, and the choice of the board was Nora 
A. Gordon. The definite appointment 
came in January, 1889. On Sunday even- 
ing, February 17, an impressive missionary 
service was held in the chapel at Spelman. 
Interesting items were given by the students ] 
with reference to the slave-trade in East 
Africa and the efforts being made for its 
suppression, also with reference to Moham- 
medanism, the spiritual awakening among 
the Zulus, and the mission stations estab- 
lished, especially those on the Congo. Sev- 
eral letters were read, one from Miss Flem- 
ing exciting the most intense interest ; and 
throughout the meeting was the thought : 
that Nora Gordon was also soon to go to 
Africa. On March 6 a farewell service was 
held, and attended by a great crowd of peo- 



NORA GORDON 47 

pie, among them the whole family of the 
consecrated young woman; and she sailed 
March 16, 1889. 

First of all she went to London, tarrying 
at the Missionary Training Institute con- 
ducted by Rev. and Mrs. H. Grattan Guin- 
ness. Under date April 11 she wrote: "It 
has been so trying to remain here so long 
waiting. I feel that this is the dear Lord's 
first lesson to me in patience. I am thank- 
ful to say that I feel profited by my stay. 
* * * * Yesterday coming from the 
city we saw a number of flags hanging across 
the street, and among them was the United 
States flag. Never before did the Stars and 
Stripes seem so beautiful. I am glad Miss 
Grover put one in my box. * * * * X 
do praise God for every step I get nearer 
to my future home. We expect to sail next 
Wednesday, April 17, from Rotterdam on 
the steamer African, Dutch line. We hope 
to get to the Congo in three weeks." 

For two years she labored at Palabala, 
frequently writing letters home and occa- 
sionally sending back to her beloved Spel- 
man a box of curios. Said she of those 
among whom she worked: "When the peo- 
ple are first gathered into a chapel for schoo] 



48 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

or religious services, it is sad and amusing 
to see how hard they try to know just what 
to do, a number sitting with their backs to 
the preacher or teacher. When the teacher 
reproves a child, every man, woman, and 
child feels it his or her duty to yell out too 
at the offender and tell him to obey the 
teacher. Often in the midst of a sermon a 
man in the congregation will call out to the 
preacher, 'Take away your lies,' or 'We do 
not believe you,' or 'How can this or that 
be?' One of the first workers, after speak- 
ing to a crowd of heathen, asked them all 
to close their eves and bow their^ heads while 
he would pray to God. When the mission- 
ary had finished his prayer and opened his 
eyes, every person had stealthily left the 
place." Then followed, a detail of the atroci- 
ties in the Congo and of the encounters be- 
tween the natives and the Belgian officers, 
and last of all came thei pertinent comment : 
"The Congo missionary's work is twofold. 
He. must civilize, as well as Christianize, the 
people." 

Early in 1891 Nora Gordon, sadly in need 
of rest and refreshment, went from Pala- 
bala for a little stay at Lukungu. Hither 
had come Clara ^ A. Howard, Spelman's 
second representative, under appointment 



NOBA GORDON 49 

of the Woman's Foreign Missionary Soci- 
ety of the East. Lukungu is a station two 
hundred and twenty miles from the mouth 
of the Congo, in a , populous district, and 
was the center from which numerous other 
schools and churches sprang. The work 
was in charge of Mr. Hoste, an English- 
man, who, when Miss Gordon wrote of him 
in 1894, had spent ten years on the Congo 
without going home. Other men were as- 
sociated with him, while the elementary 
schools, the care of the boys and girls, and 
work among the women, naturally fell to 
the women missionaries. A little later in 
1891 Nora Gordon left Palabala perma- 
nently to engage in the work at Lukungu. 
Under date September 25 she wrote to her 
friends back home: "Doubtless Clara has 
told you of my change to this place. You 
can not imagine how glad we are to be to- 
gether here. I have charge of the printing- 
office and help in the afternoon school. I 
am well, happy, and am enjoying my work. 
In the office I have few conveniences and 
really not the things we need. Mr. Hoste 
has written the first arithmetic in this lan- 
guage and I am now putting it up. I was 
obliged to stop work on it to-day because 
my figures in type gave out, and you know 



50 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

we have no shops in this land. My boys in 
the office are doing nicely." 



Thus she worked on for two years more- 
hoping, praying, trusting. - By 1893 her 
health was in such condition that it was 
deemed wise for her to return to America. 
So she did, and she brought back two na- 
tive girls with her. All the while, however, 
her chief thought was upon the work to 
which she had given herself, and she con- 
stantly looked forward to the time when she 
might be able to go back to Africa. In 1895 
she became the wife of Rev. S. C. Gordon, 
who was connected with the English Bap- 
tist Mission at Stanley Pool. She sailed 
with her husband from Boston in July and 
reached the Congo again in August. The 
station was unique. It was an old and well 
established mission, the center of several 
others in the surrounding country. It had 
excellent brick houses, broad avenues and t 
good fruit-trees, and the students were ^ 
above the average in intelligence. But soon 
the shadow fell. Nora Gordon herself saw 
much of the well known Belgian atrocities 
in the Congo. She saw houses burned and 
the natives themselves driven out by the 
state officials. They crossed over into the 
French Congo ; but hither Protestants were 



NORA GORDON 51 

not allowed to come to preach to them. In 
spite of the great heartache, however, and 
declining health the heroic woman worked 
on, giving to those for whom she labored her 
tenderest love. Seven months after the 
death of her second child a change was again 
deemed necessary, and she once more turned 
her face homeward. After two months in 
Belgium and England she came again to 
America, and to Spelman. But her strength 
was now all spent. She died at Spelman 
January 26, 1901. She was only thirty- 
four ; but who can measure in years the love 
and faith, the hope and sorrow, of such a 
life? 

Nora Gordon started a tradition, Spel- 
man's richest heritage. Three other gradu- 
ates followed her. Clara Howard was in 
course of time forced b}^ the severe fevers 
to give up her work, and she now labors at 
home in the service of her Alma Mater. 
Ada Jackson became the second wife of 
Rev. S. C. Gordon and also died in service. 
Emma B. DeLany was commissioned in 
1900 and still labors — in recent years with 
larger and larger success — in Liberia. With- 
in two or three years of Nora Gordon's re- 
turn in 1893, moreover, not less than five na- 
tive African girls had come to Spelman. The 



52 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

spirit still abides, and if the way were just 
a little clearer doubtless many other gradu- 
ates would go. Even as it is, however, the 
blessing to the school has been illimitable. 

*I* *!» 1^ 'i*^ 

Such have been the workers, such the pio- 
neers. To what end is the love, the labor — 
the loneliness, the yearning? 

It is now nearly ^ye hundred years since 
a prince of Portugal began the slave-trade 
on the west coast of Africa. Within two 
hundred j^ears all of the leading countries 
of western Europe had joined in the iniqui- 
tous traffic, and when England in 1713 drew 
up with France the Peace of Utrecht she 
deemed the slave-trade of such importance 
that she insisted upon an article that gave 
her a practical monopoly of it. Before the 
end of the eighteenth century, however, the 
voice of conscience began to be heard in 
England, and science also began to be inter- 
ested in the great undeveloped continent 
lying to the South. It remained for the 
work of David Livingstone, however, in the 
middle of the nineteenth century really to 
reveal Africa to the rest of the world. This 
intrepid explorer and missionary in a re- 
markable series of journeys not only trav- 



NORA GORDON 53 

ersed the continent from the extreme South 
to Loanda on the West Coast and Quili- 
mane on the East Coast; he not only made 
known the great lake system of Central 
Africa; but he left behind him a memory 
that has blessed everyone who has followed 
in his steps. Largely as a result of his work 
and that of his successor, Stanley, a great 
congress met in Berlin in 1884 for the par- 
tition of Africa among the great nations of 
Europe. Unfortunately the diplomats at 
this meeting were not actuated by the noble 
impulses that had moved Livingstone, so 
that more and more there was evident a mad 
scramble for territory. France had already 
gained a firm foothold in the northwest, and 
England was not only firmly intrenched in 
the South but had also established a rather 
undefined protectorate over Egypt. Ger- 
many now in 1884 entered the field and in 
German East Africa, German Southwest 
Africa, Kamerun, and the smaller territory 
of Togoland in the West ultimately ac- 
quired a total of nearly a million square 
miles, or one-eleventh of the continent. All 
of this she lost in the course of the recent 
great war. Naturally she has desired to re- 
gain this land, but at the time of writing 
(November, 1918) there is no likelihood of 
her doing so, a distinguished Englishman, 



54 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

Mr. Balfour, the foreign secretary, having 
declared that under no circumstances can 
Germany's African colonies be returned to 
her, as such return would endanger the se- 
curity of the British empire, and that is to 
say, the security of the world. This prob- 
lem is but typical of the larger political 
questions that press for settlement in the 
new Africa. Whatever the solution may be, 
one or two facts stand out clearly. One is 
that Africa can no longer rest in undis- 
turbed slumber. A terrible war, the most 
ruinous in the history of humanity, has 
strained to the utmost the resources of all 
the great powers of the world. Where so 
much has been spent it is not to be supposed 
that the richest, the most fertile, land in 
the world will indefinitely be allowed to re- 
main undeveloped. Along with material de- 
velopment must go also the education and 
the spiritual culture of the natives on a scale 
undreamed of before. In this training such 
an enlightened country as England will 
naturally play a leading role, and America 
too will doubtless be called on to help in 
more ways than one. It must not be sup- 
posed, however, that the task is not one of 
enormous difficulties. As far as we have 
advanced in our missionary activities in 
America, we have hardly made a beginning 



NORA GORDON 55 

in the great ta.sk of the proper development 
of Africa. "^Here are approximately 175,- 
000,000 natives to be trained and Christian- 
ized. Let us not make the common mis- 
take of supposing that they are all ignorant 
and degraded savages. Nothing could be 
farther from the truth. Many individuals 
have had the benefit of travel and study in 
Europe and more and more are themselves 
appreciating the great problems before their 
country. It is true, however, that the great 
mass of the population is yet to be reached. ^^ 
In the general development delicate ques- 
tions of racial contact are to be answered. •^ 
Unfortunately, in the attitude of the Euro- 
pean colonist toward the native. South 
Africa has a race problem even more stern 
than that of our own Southern states. As 
for religion we not only find paganism and 
Mohammedanism, but we also see Catholi- 
cism arrayed against Protestantism, and 
perhaps most interesting of all, a definite 
movement toward the enhancement of a 
native Ethiopian church, with the motto 
"Africa for the Africans." Let us add to 
all this numerous social problems, such as 
polygamy, the widespread sale of rum, and 
all the train o|^African superstition, and we 
shall see that any one who works in Africa in 
the new day must not only be a person of 



56 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

keen intelligence and Christian character, 
but also one with some genuine vision and 
statesmanship. Workers of this quality, if 
they can be found, will be needed not by the 
scores or hundreds, but by the thousands and 
tens of thousands. No larger mission could 
come to a young Negro in America trained 
in Christian study than to make his or her 
life a part of the redemption of the great 
fatherland. v^The salvation of Africa is at 
once the most pressing problem before either 
the Negro race or the Kingdom of Christ. 
Such a worker as we have tried to portray 
was Nora Gordon. It is to be hoped that 
not one but thousands like her will arise. 
Even now we can see the beginning of the 
fulfilment of the prophecy, "Princes shall 
come out of Egypt; Ethiopia shall soon 
stretch out her hands unto God." 




META WARRICK FULLER 



META WARRICK FULLER 



I 



I 



IV. 



META WARRICK FULLER* 

The state of Massachusetts has always 
been famous for its history and literature, 
and especially rich in tradition is the region 
around Boston. On one side is Charles- 
town, visited yearly by thousands who make 
a pilgrimage to the Bunker Hill Monument. 
Across the Charles River is Cambridge, the 
home of Harvard University, and Long- 
fellow, and Lowell, and numerous other 
men whose work has become a part of the 
nation's heritage. If one will ride on through 
Cambridge and North Cambridge and Ar- 
lington, he will come to Lexington, where 
he will find in the little Lexington Common 
one of the most charming spots of ground 
in America. Overlooking this he will see 
the Harrington House, and all around other 
memorials of the Revolution. Taking the 
car again and riding about seven miles more 
he will come to Concord, and here he will 
catch still more of the flavor of the eight- 



*For the further pursuit of this and related subjects the 
attention of the reader is invited to the author's "The Negro In 
Literature and Art" (Duffield & Co., New York, N. Y., 1911). 

59 



60 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

eenth century. Walking from the center of 
the town down Monument Street (he must 
walk now ; there is no trolley, and a carriage 
or automobile does not permit one to linger 
by the wa^^side), he will come after a while 
to the Old Manse, once the home of Emerson 
and of Hawthorne, and then see just around 
the corner the Concord Bridge and the 
statue of the Minute Man. There is a new 

bridsre now, one of concrete ; the old wooden 

1. J ' ' 

one, so long beloved, at length became un- 
safe and had to be replaced. In another 
direction from the center of the town runs 
Lexington Road, within about half a mile 
do\^Ti which one will see the later homes of 
Emerson and Hawthorne as well as that 
of Louisa Vl^Y Alcott. Xear the Alcott 
House, back among the trees, is a quaint 
little structure much like a Southern coun- 
try schoolhouse — the so-called Concord 
School of Philosophy, in which Emerson 
once spoke. It is all a beautiful country — 
beautiful most of all for its unseen ^lorv. 
One gives himself up to reflection ; he muses 
on Evangeline and the Great Stone Face 
and on the heroic dead who did not die in 
vain — until a lumbering truck-car on the 
road calls him back from it all to the work- 
adav world of men. 



META WARRICK FULLER 61 

It is in this state of Massachusetts, so 
rich in its tradition, that there resides the 
subject of the present sketch. About half- 
way between Boston and Worcester, in the 
quiet, homelike town of Framingham, on a 
winding road just off the main street, lives 
Meta Warrick Fuller, the foremost sculptor 
of the Negro race. 

There are three little boys in the family. 
They keep their mother very busy ; but they 
also make her very happy. Buttons have 
to be sewed on and dinners have to be pre- 
pared for the children of an artist just as 
well as for those of other people; and help 
is not always easy to get. But the father, 
Dr. S. C. Fuller, a distinguished phj^sician, 
is also interested in the bovs, so that he too 
helps, and the home is a happy one. 

At the top of the house is a long roomy 
attic. This is an improvised studio — or, as 
the sculptor would doubtless say, the work- 
shop. Hither, from the busy work of the 
morning, comes the artist for an hour or 
half an hour of modeling — for rest, and for 
the first eiFort to transfer to the plastic clay 
some fleeting transient dream. 

Meta Warrick Fuller was born in Phila- 
delphia, Pennsylvania, June 9, 1877. For 



62 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

four years she attended the Pennsylvania 
School of Industrial Art, and it was at this 
institution that she first began to force seri- 
ous recognition of her talent. Before very 
long she began to be known as a sculptor 
of the horrible, one of her first original 
pieces being a head of Medusa, with a hang- 
ing jaw, beads of gore, and eyes starting 
from their sockets. At her graduation in 
1898 she won a prize for metal work by a 
crucifix upon which hung the figure of 
Christ in agony, and she also won honorable 
mention for her work in modeling. In a 
post-graduate year she won a much coveted 
prize in modeling. In 1899 Meta Warrick 
(then best known by her full name, Meta 
Vaux Warrick) went to Paris, where she 
worked and studied three years. Her work 
brought her in contact with many other ar- 
tists, among them Augustus St. Gaudens, 
the sculptor of the Robert Gould Shaw \ 
Monument at the head of Boston Common. 
Then there came a day when by appoint- 'I 
ment the young woman went to see Auguste 
Rodin, who after years of struggle and dis- \ 
praise had finally won recognition as the ' 
foremost sculptor in France if not in the 
world. The great man glanced one after 
another at the pieces that were presented to 
him, without very evident interest. At 



i 



META WARRICK FULLER 63 

length, thrilled by the figure in "Silent 
Sorrow," sometimes referred to as "Man 
Eating His Heart Out," Rodin beamed 
upon the young woman and said, "Madem- 
oiselle, you are a sculptor; you have the 
sense of form." With encouragement from 
such a source the young artist worked with 
renewed vigor, looking forward to the time 
when something that she had produced 
should win a place in the Salon, the great 
national gallery in Paris. "The Wretched," 
one of the artist's masterpieces, was exhib- 
ited here in 1903, and along with it went 
"The Impenitent Thief." This latter pro- 
duction was demolished in 1904, after meet- 
ing with various unhappy accidents. In the 
form as presented, however, the thief, he- 
roic in size, hung on the cross torn by an- 
guish. Hardened, unsympathetic, and even 
defiant, he still possessed some admirable 
qualities of strength, and he has remained 
one of the sculptor's most powerful concep- 
tions. In "The Wretched" seven figures 
greet the eye. Each represents a different 
form of human anguish. An old man, worn 
by hunger and disease, waits for death. A 
mother yearns for the loved ones she has 
lost. A man bowed by shame fears to look 
upon his fellow-creatures. A sick child 
suffers from some hereditary taint. A youth 



64 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

is in despair, and a woman is crazed by sor- 
row. Over all is the Philosopher who suffers 
perhaps more keenly than the others as he 
views the misery aromid them, and who, 
powerless to relieve it, also sinks into de- 
spair. 

Other early productions were similarly 
characterized by a strongly romantic qual- 
ity. "Silent Sorrow" has already been re- 
marked in passing. In this a man, worn and 
gaunt and in despair, is represented as lean- | 
ing over and actually eating out his own 1 
heart. "Man Carrying Dead Body" is in 
similar vein. The sculptor is moved by the 
thought of one who will be spurred on by 
the impulse of dut}^ to the performance of 
some task not only unpleasant but even 
loathsome. She shows a man bearing across 
his shoulder the body of a comrade that has 
evidently lain on the battlefield for days. 
The thing is horrible, and the man totters 
under the great weight; but he forces his 
way onward until he can give it decent 
burial. Another early production was 
based on the ancient Greek story of Oedi- 
pus. This story was somewhat as follows: 
Oedipus was the son of Laius and Jocasta, 
king and queen of Thebes. At his birth an 
oracle foretold that the father Laius would 



4f *•*! 



META WARRICK FULLER 65 

be killed by his son. The child was sent 
away to be killed by exposure, but in course 
of time was saved and afterwards adopted 
by the King of Corinth. When he was 
grown, being warned by an oracle that he 
would kill his father and marry his mother, 
he left home. On his journey he met Laius 
and slew him in the course of an altercation. 
Later, by solving the riddle of the sphinx, 
he freed Thebes from distress, was made 
king of the city, and married Jocasta. 
Eventually the terrible truth of the rela- 
tionship became known to all. Jocasta 
hanged herself and Oedipus tore out his 
eyes. The sculptor portrays the hero of the 
old legend at the very moment that he is thus 
trjang to punish himself for his crime. 
There is nothing delicate or pretty about all 
such work as this. It is grewsome in fact, 
and horrible; but it is also strong and in- 
tense and vital. Its merit was at once rec- 
ognized by the French, and it gave Meta 
Warrick a recognized place among the 
sculptors of America. 

On her return to America the artist re- 
sumed her studies at the School of Indus- 
trial Art, winning in 1904 the Battles first 
prize for pottery. In 190T she produced a 
series of tableaux representing the advance 



-H 



66 WOMEN OF ACEIEYEMENT 

of the Negro for the Jamestown Tercenten- 
nial Exposition, and in 1913 a group for the 
New York State Emancipation Proclama- 
tion Commission. In 1909 she became the 
wife of Dr. Solomon C. Fuller, of Fram- 
ingham, Massachusetts. A fire in 1910 un- 
fortunately destroyed some of her most 
valuable pieces while they were in storage 
in Philadelphia. Only a few examples of 
her earty work, that happened to be else- 
where, were saved. The artist was un- 
daunted, however, and b}^ May, 1914, she 
had sufficiently recovered from the blow to 
be able to hold at her home a public exhi- 
bition of her work. 

After this fire a new note crept into the 
work of JMeta Warrick Fuller. This was 
doubtless due not so much to the fire itself 
as to the larger conception of life that now 
came to the sculptor with the new duties of 
marriage and motherhood. From this time 
forth it was not so much the romantic as the 
social note that was emphasized. Repre- 
sentative of the new influence was the sec- 
ond model of the group for the Emancipa- 
tion Proclamation Commission. A recently 
emancipated Negro youth and maiden stand 
beneath a gnarled, decapitated tree that has 
what looks almost like a human hand 



META WARRICK FULLER 67 

stretched over them. Humanity is pushing 
them forth into the world while at the same 
time the hand of Destiny is restraining them 
in the full exercise of their freedom. "Im- 
migrant in America" is in somewhat similar 
vein. An American woman, the mother of 
one strong healthy child, is shown welcom- 
ing to the land of plenty the foreigner, the 
mother of several poorl}^ nourished chidren. 
Closely related in subject is the smaller 
piece, "The Silent Appeal," in which a 
mother capable of producing and caring for 
three sturdy children is shown as making a 
quiet demand for the suffrage and for any 
other privileges to which a human being is 
entitled. All of these productions are clear 
cut, straightforward, and dignified. 

In May, 1917, Meta Warrick Fuller took 
second prize in a competition under the 
auspices of the Massachusetts Branch of the 
Woman's Peace Party, her subject being 
"Peace Halting the Ruthlessness of War." 
War is personified as on a mighty steed and 
trampling to death numberless human be- 
ings. In one hand he holds a spear on which 
he has transfixed the head of one of his vic- 
tims. As he goes on his masterful career 
Peace meets him and commands him to cease 
his ravages. The work as exhibited was in 



6^ WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

gray-green wax and was a production of 
most unusual spirit. 

Among other prominent titles are "Watch- 
ing for Dawn," a conception of remarkable 
beauty and yearning, and "Mother and 
Child." An early production somewhat de- 
tached from other pieces is a head of John 
the Baptist. This is one of the most haunt- 
ing creations of Mrs. Fuller. In it she was 
especially successful in the infinite yearning 
and pathos that she somehow managed to 
give to the eyes of the seer. It bears the 
unmistakable stamp of power. 

In this whole review of this sculptor's 
v/ork we have indicated only the chief 
titles. She is an indefatigable worker and 
has produced numerous smaller pieces, 
many of these being naturally for commer- 
cial purposes. As has been remarked, while 
her w^ork was at first romantic and often 
even horrible, in recent years she has been 
interested rather in social themes. There 
are those, however, who hope that she will 
not utterly forsake the field in which she 
first became distinguished. Through the 
sternness of her early work speaks the very 
tragedy of the ISTegro race. In any case it 
is pleasant to record that the foremost 



META WABBICK FULLEB 69 

sculptor of the race is not only an artist of 
rank but also a woman who knows and ap- 
preciates in the highest possible manner the 
virtues and the beautie* of the home. 



I 



I 




I 



MARY McLEOD BETHUNE 



MARY McLEOD BETHUNE 



V. 

MARY McLEOD BETHUNE 

On October 8, 1904s a lone woman, in- 
spired by the desire to do something for the 
needy ones of her race and state, began at 
Daytona, Florida, a training school for 
Negro girls. She had only one dollar and 
a half in money, but she had faith, energy, 
and a heart full of love for her people.) To- 
day she has an institution worth not less 
than one hundred thousand dollars, with 
plans for extensive and immediate enlarge- 
ment, and her school is one of the best con- 
ducted and most clear-visioned in the coun- 
try. Such has been the result of boundless 
energy and thrift joined to an unwavering 
faith in God. 

Mary McLeod was born July 10, 1875, in 
a three-room log cabin on a little cotton and 
rice farm about three miles from Mayes- 
ville. South Carolina, being one in the large 
family of Samuel and Patsy McLeod. Am- 
bitious even from her early years, she 
yearned for larger and finer things than her 
environment afforded; and yet even the life 

73 



74 W03IEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

that she saw around her was to prove a 
blessing in disguise, as it gave to her deeper 
and clearer insight into the problems, the 
shortcomings, and the needs of her people. 
In course of time she attended a little mis- 
sion school in Mayesville, and she was con- 
verted at the age of twelve. Later she was 
graduated at Scotia Seminary, Concord, 
North Carolina, and then she went to the 
Moody Bible Institute in Chicago. In the 
j^ears of her schooling she received some as- 
sistance from a scholarship given by Miss 
JMary Chrisman, a dressmaker of Denver, | 
Colorado. JMary McLeod never forgot that 
she had been helped by a working woman. 
Some day she intended to justify that faith, 
and time has shown that never was a scholar- 
ship invested to better advantage. 

In 1898 Mary McLeod was married. She 
became the mother of one son. Not long 
after, the family moved to Palatka, Florida. 
Now followed the hard years of waiting, of 
praying, of hoping; but through it all the 
earnest woman never lost faith in herself, 
nor in God. She gained experience in a 
little school that she taught, she sang with 
unusual effect in the churches of the town, 
and she took part in any forward movement 
or uplift enterprise that she could. All the 



MARY McLEOD BETHUNE 75 

while, however, she knew that the big task 
was yet to come. She prayed, and hoped, 
and waited. 

By the fall of 1904 it seemed that the time 
had come. In a little rented house, with five 
girls, Mrs. Bethune began what is now the 
Daytona Normal and Industrial Institute 
for Negro Girls. By means of concerts and 
festivals the first payment of five dollars was 
made on the present site, then an old dump- 
pile. With their own hands the teacher and 
the pupils cleared away much of the rubbish, 
and from the first they invited the co-opera- 
ion of the people around them by lending a 
helping hand in any way they could, by 
"being neighborly." In 1905 a Board of 
Trustees was organized and the school was 
chartered. In 1907 Faith Hall, a four-story 
frame house, forty by fifty feet, was "prayed 
up, sung up, and talked up;" and we can 
understand at what a premium space was in 
the earlier days when we know that this 
building furnished dormitory accommoda- 
tions for teachers and students, dining-room, 
reading room, storerooms, and bathrooms. 
To the rear of Faith Hall was placed a two- 
story structure containing the school kitchen 
and the domestic science room. In 1909 the 
school found it necessary to acquire a farm 



76 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

for the raising of live stock and vegetables 
and for the practical outdoor training of the 
girls. After six weeks of earnest work the 
twelve-acre tract in front of the school was 
purchased. In 1914 a Model Home was 
built. In this year also an additional west 
farm of six acres, on which was a two-story 
frame building, was needed, asked for, and 
procured. In March, 1918, the labors of 
fourteen years were crowned by the erection 
and dedication of a spacious auditorium; 
and among the speakers at the dedication 
were the Governor of Florida and the Vice- 
President of the United States. Efforts now 
look forward to a great new dormitory for 
the girls. 



\ 



Such a bare account of achievements, 
however, by no means gives one an adequate 
conception of the striving and the hoping 
and the praying that have entered into the 
work. To begin with, Daytona was a strate- 
gic place for the school. There was no other 
such school along the entire east coast of 
Florida, and as a place of unusual beauty 
and attractiveness the town was visited 
throughout the winter by wealthy tourists. 
From the very first, however, the girls were 
trained in the virtues of the home, and in 
self-help. Great emphasis was placed on 



MABY McLEOD BETHUNE 77 

domestic science, and not only for this as an 
end in itself, but also as a means for the 
larger training in cleanliness and thrift and 
good taste. "We notice strawberries are 
selling at fifty and sixty cents a quart," said 
a visitor, "and you have a splendid patch. 
Do you use them for your students or sell 
them?" "We never eat a quart when we 
can get fifty cents for them," was the reply. 
"We can take fifty cents and buy a bone that 
will make soup for us all, when a quart of 
berries would supply only a few." 

For one interested in education few pic- 
tures could be more beautiful than that of 
the dining-room at the school in the morning 
of a day in midterm. Florida is warm often 
even in midwinter; nevertheless, rising at 
five gives one a keen appetite for the early 
breakfast. The ceiling is low and there are 
other obvious disadvantages; but over all is 
the spirit of good cheer and of home. The 
tablecloths are very white and clean ; flowers 
are on the different tables; at the head of 
each a teacher presides over five or six girls ; 
the food is nourishing and well-prepared; 
and one leaves with the feeling that if he had 
a sister or daughter he would like for her to 
have the training of some such place as this. 



78 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

Of such quality is the work that has been 
built up; and all has been accomplished 
through the remarkable personality of the 
woman who is the head and the soul of every 
effort. Indomitable courage, boundless en- 
ergy, fine tact and a sense of the fitness of 
things, kindly spirit, and firm faith in God 
have deservedly given her success. Beyond 
the bounds of her immediate institution her 
influence extends. About the year 1912 the 
trustees felt the need of so extending the 
work as to make the school something of a 
community center; and thus arose the Mc- 
Leod Hospital and Training School for 
Nurses. In 1912, moved by the utter neg- 
lect of the children of the turpentine camp 
at Tomoka, Mrs. Bethune started work for 
them in a little house that she secured. The 
aim was to teach the children to be clean and 
truthful and helpful, to sew and to sweep j 
and to sing. A short school term was I 
started among them, and the mission serves 
as an excellent practice school for the girls 
of the senior class in the Training School. 
A summer school and a playground have 
also been started for the children in Day- 
tona. Nor have the boys and young men 
been neglected. Here was a problem of 
imusual difficulty. Any one who has looked 
into the inner life of the small towns of 






MARY McLEOD BETEUNE 79 

Florida could not fail to be impressed by the 
situation of the boys and young men. Hotel 
life, a shifting tourist population, and a cli- 
mate of unusual seductiveness, have all left 
their impress. On every side to the young 
man beckons temptation, and in town after 
town one finds not one decent recreation 
center or uplifting social influence. Pool- 
rooms abound, and the young man is blamed 
for entering forbidden paths; but all too 
often the Christian men and women of the 
community have put forth no definite organ- 
ized effort for his uplift. All too often 
there results a blasted life — a heartache for 
a mother, or a ruined home for some young 
woman. In Daytona, in 1913, on a lot near 
the school campus, one of the trustees, Mr. 
George S. Doane, erected a neat, commodi- 
ous building to be used in connection with 
the extension work of the institution as a 
general reading-room and home for the 
Young Men's Christian Association; and 
this is the only specific work so being done 
for Negro boys in this section of the state. 
A debating club, an athletic club, lecture 
club, and prayer-meetings all serve as means 
toward the physical, intellectual, and spir- 
itual development of the young men. A 
"Better Boys Movement" is also making 
progress and the younger boys are becom- 



80 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

ing interested in canning and farming as 
well as being cared for in their sports and 
games. 

No sketch of this woman's work should 
close without mention of her activities for 
the nation at large. Red Cross work or a 
Liberty Loan drive has alike called forth her 
interest and her energy. She has appeared 
on some great occasions and before distin- 
guished audiences, such as that for instance 
in the Belasco Theatre in Washington in 
December, 1917, when on a noteworthy pa- 
triotic occasion she was the only representa- 
tive of her race to speak. 

Her girls have gone into many spheres of 
life and have regularly made themselves 
useful and desirable. Nearly two hundred 
are now annually enrolled at the school. 
The demand for them as teachers, seam- 
stresses, or cooks far exceeds the supply. In 
great homes and humble, in country or in 
town, in Daytona or elsewhere — North, 
South, East, West — they remember the 
motto of their teacher and of the Master of 
all, "Not to be ministered unto but to min- 
ister;" and year after year they accomplish 
better and better things for the school that 



MARY McLEOD BETHUNE 81 

they love so well and through it for the 
Kingdom of God. 

««fe jAi :4i ^& 

TfT «fr <(|r 9pr 

Two thousand years ago the Savior of 
Mankind walked upon the earth, a man of 
sorrows and acquainted with grief; and the 
people hid as it were their faces from him. 
But one day he went into the home of a 
Pharisee and sat him down to meat. And a 
woman of the city, when she knew that 
Jesus sat at meat in the Pharisee's house, 
brought an alabaster box of ointment, ex- 
ceeding precious, and began to wash his feet 
with her tears, and did wipe them with the 
hairs of her head, and kissed his feet, and 
anointed them with the ointment. And there 
were some that had indignation among them- 
selves, and said. Why was this waste of the 
ointment made? But Jesus said. Let her 
alone. She hath wrought a good work on 
me. She hath done what she could. Verily, 
I say unto you. Wheresoever this gospel 
shall be preached throughout the whole 
world, this also that she hath done shall be 
spoken of for a memorial of her. 

To-day as well as centuries ago the Christ 
is before us, around us, waiting. We do not 
always know him, for he appears in dis- 



82 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

guise, as a little orphan, or a sick old woman, 
or even perhaps as some one of high estate 
but in need of prayer. Let us do what we 
can. Let each one prove herself an earnest 
follower. To such end is the effort of Mary 
McLeod Bethune; and as we think of all 
that she has done and is doing let us for our 
own selves once more recall the beautiful 
words of Sister Moore: *'There is no place 
too lowly or dark for our feet to enter, and 
no place so high and bright but it needs the 
touch of the light that we carry from the 
Cross." 




MARY CHURCH TERRELL 



MARY CHURCH TERRELL 



I 



VI. 



MARY CHURCH TERRELL 

With the increasingly complex problems 
of American civilization, woman is being 
called on in ways before undreamed of to 
bear a share in great public burdens. The 
recent great war has demonstrated anew 
the part that she is to play in our factories, 
our relief work, our religious organizations 
— in all the activities of our social and indus- 
trial life. The broadening basis of the suf- 
frage in some states and the election of a 
woman to a seat in Congress have also em- 
phasized the fact that in the new day woman 
as well as man will have to bear the larger 
responsibilities of citizenship. In all this 
intense life the Negro woman has taken a 
part, and she will have to do still more in the 
future. Even before the Civil War there 
were women of the race who labored, some- 
times in large ways, for the influencing of 
sentiment and the salvation of their people. 
In the present period of our country's his- 
tory new problems arise, sometimes even 
more delicate than those that went before 
them and even more diflicult of solution — 

85 



86 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

problems of education, readjustment, and of 
the proper moulding of public opinion. 
They call for keen intelligence, broad infor- 
mation, rich culture, and the ability to meet 
men and women of other races and other 
countries on the broad plane of cosmopoli- 
tanism. In public life and in the higher 
graces of society no woman of the race has 
commanded more attention from the Ameri- 
can and the international public than Mary 
Church Terrell. 

The life of tliis woman is an example of 
the possibilities not only of Xegro but of 
American womanhood. She has appeared 
on platforms with men and women of other 
races, sometimes sturdy opponents on pub- 
lic questions, and more than held her own. 
She has attended an international congress 
in Europe and surpassed all the other 
women from her country in her ability to 
address audiences in languages other than 
English. With all this she has never for- 
gotten the religious impulse that is so 
strong in the heart of her people and that 
ultimately is to play so large a part in their 
advancement. One admirer of her culture 
has said, "She should be engaged to travel 
over the country as a model of ffood man- 
ners and good English." 



MART CHURCH TERRELL 87 

Mary Church was born in Memphis, 
Tennessee, the daughter of Robert R. and 
Louisa Ayres Church. When she was yet 
very young her parents sent her to Ohio to 
be educated, and here she remained until 
she was graduated from the classical course 
in 1884. Then for two years she taught at 
Wilberforce University in Ohio, and for one 
year more in a high school in Washington. 
Desirous of broadening her attainments, 
however, she now went to Europe for a 
period of study and travel. She remained 
two years, spending the time in France, 
Switzerland, Germany, and Italy, generally 
improving herself in language. On her re- 
turn she resumed her work in Washington, 
and she was offered the registrarship at 
Oberlin College, a distinct compliment com- 
ing as it did from an institution of such high 
standing. She declined the attractive po- 
sition, however, because of her approaching 
marriage to Robert H. Terrell, a graduate 
of Harvard College and formerly principal 
of a high school in Washington, who was 
appointed to a judgeship in the District of 
Columbia by President Roosevelt. 

Since her marriage Mrs. Terrell has writ- 
ten much on topics of general interest and 
from time to time has formally appeared as 



88 J WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

a public lecturer. One of her strongest arti- 
cles was that on Lynching in the North 
American Review for June, 1904. The cen- 
tenary of the birth of Harriet Beecher 
Stowe in 1912 found her unusually well 
posted on the life and work of the novelist, 
so that after she lectured many times on the 
subject she brought together the results of 
her study in an excellent pamphlet. She 
was the first president of the National As- 
sociation of Colored Women's Clubs, was 
twice re-elected, and, declining to serve fur- 
ther, was made honorary president for life. 
She was chosen as one of the speakers at the 
International Congress of Women held in 
Berlin in June, 1904. Said the Washington 
Post of her performance on this occasion: 
''The hit of the Congress on the part of the 
American delegates was made by Mrs. 
JNIary Church Terrell of Washington, who 
delivered one speech in German and another 
in equally good French. Mrs. Terrell is a 
colored woman who appears to have been 
beyond ever}^ other of our delegates promi- 
nent for her ability to make addresses in 
other than her own language." In a letter 
to some of the largest newspapers in the 
country Mrs. Ida Husted Harper said fur- 
ther: "This achievement on the part of a 
colored woman, added to a fine appearance 



MARY CHURCH TERRELL 81 

and the eloquence of her words, carried the 
audience by storm and she had to respond 
three times to the encores before they were 
satisfied. It was more than a personal tri- 
umph; it was a triumph for her race." 

Mrs. Terrell has ever exhibited an in- 
tense interest in public affairs. On the occa- 
sion of the discharge of the Negro soldiers 
in Brownsville, Texas, in 1906, she at once 
comprehended the tremendous issues in= 
volved and by her interviews with men high 
in the nation's life did much for the im- 
provement of a bad situation. When, some 
years ago, Congress by resolution granted 
power to the Commissioners of the District 
of Columbia to appoint two women upon the 
Board of Education for the public schools, 
Mrs. Terrell was one of the women ap- 
pointed. She served on the Board for five 
years with signal ability and unusual suc- 
cess, and on the occasion of her resignation 
in 1912 was given a magnificent testimonial 
by her fellow-citizens. 

It would be difficult to record all the dif- 
ferent things that Mary Church Terrell has 
done or the numerous ways in which she has 
turned sentiment on the race problem. In 
recent years she has been drawn more and 



90 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

more to her own home. She is in constant 
demand as a speaker, however, and one or 
two experiences or incidents must not pass 
unremarked. In 1906 she was invited by 
Prof. Jeremiah W. Jenks to come to Cor- 
nell University to deliver her address on the 
Bright Side of the Race Problem. She was 
introduced by Prof. F. A. Fetter of the De- 
partment of Economics. When she had fin- 
ished her lecture she was greeted by deafen- 
ing applause, and then she v/as surrounded 
by an eager crowd desirous of receiving an 
introduction. One enthusiastic woman ex- 
claimed, as she warmly shook the speaker's 
hand, "I was so glad to hear you say some- 
thing about the bright side, and — do you 
know? — every Southern faculty woman was 
here." A little later she was the guest of 
honor at a reception in the home of Ex- 
Ambassador Andrew D. White, the first 
president of Cornell University. 

Just what Mary Church Terrell means as 
an inspiration to the young women of the 
Negro race one might have seen some years 
ago if he could have been present at Spelman 
Seminary on the occasion of the tv/enty-fifth 
anniversary of this the largest school for 
Negro girls in the world. She was preceded 
on the program by one or two prominent 



3IARY CHURCH TERRELL 91 

speakers who tried to take a broad view of 
the race problem but who were plainly baf- 
fled when they came face to face with South- 
ern prejudice. When Mrs. Terrell rose to 
speak the air was tense with eagerness and 
anxiety. How she acquitted herself on this 
occasion, how eloquently she plead, and how 
nimbly and delicately she met her oppo- 
nents' arguments, will never be forgotten by 
anj^ one who was privileged to hear her. 

The compliments that have been paid to 
the eloquence, the grace, the culture, the 
tact, and the poise of this woman are end- 
less. She exhibits exceptional attainments 
either on or off the platform. Her words 
bristle with earnestness and energy, quickly 
captivating an audience or holding the 
closest attention in conversation. Her ges- 
tures are frequent, but always in sympa- 
thetic harmony. Her face is inclined to be 
sad in repose, but lights quickly and effec- 
tively to the soul of whatever subject she 
touches. Her voice is singularly clear and 
free from harsh notes. She exhibits no ap- 
parent effort in speaking, and at once im- 
presses an audience by her ease, her courage, 
and her self-abnegation. Through all her 
work moreover constantly thrills her great 
hope for the young men and women of her 



92 WOMEN OF ACHIEVEMENT 

race, so many of whom she has personally 
inspired. 

Such a woman is an asset to her country 
and an honor to the race to which she be- 
longs. 



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